A PROPOSAL has been lodged for a £32 million redevelopment of Bishopbriggs town centre which will include a large retail store, other retail units, residential property and a care home.
BL Developments has announced plans to redevelop the former Scottish Power HQ site at Portobello in Edinburgh in a total investment likely to be more that £100m over several years with the plan incorporating artisan studios, a nursery, a wellbeing ce
ntre and homes.
And the Cheshire-based Gladman has launched the first phase of a 136,908sq ft business park in Dundee which will have an end value of up to £25m.
So with credit still crunching in an unhappy market, imaginative schemes are still coming forward in preparation for better days to come.
Two of them in East Lothian – one a proposal, the other completed – lean heavily on the area's rich agricultural history and on individuals who have played pioneering roles in the development of agriculture.
The first is an application for planning permission for a multi-million pound, high-quality heritage, leisure and retail centre at East Linton which is to be submitted to East Lothian Council.
Phantassie Heritage, in association with the property owner, Rennie Meikle, wants to restore and redevelop Phantassie Steading as a major attraction which will have agricultural and industrial heritage exhibits, a children's theme interpretative play centre, specialist retailing and bar and restaurant facilities backed by 248 car parking spaces.
Vivian Linacre of Phantassie said: "Phantassie is at the heart of Scotland's agricultural revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries. It was here that Andrew Meikle invented the first effective threshing machine.
"The agricultural and industrial heritage of Phantassie will form an integral part of the development. We envisage this as a major tourist and retail attraction which will make an important contribution to the economy of East Lothian."
The second is in East Lothian's Ormiston, where the former miners' institute has been converted into 5,500sq ft of small business suites – the first office development in the village – and two of the suites have already been snapped up.
Rents are fixed at £10 per sq ft and the building has been named the Cockburn Halls, after Ormiston's John Cockburn, who designed the village in 1735 as a model village and is regarded as a pioneer of the agricultural revolution.
Agent Christopher Lamotte, of chartered surveyor Chalmers & Co, makes full use of the Cockburn connection. He says: "Cockburn was an innovator, a visionary and an entrepreneur, perfect themes for the businesses that base themselves at Cockburn Halls."
The Gladman development in Dundee is the Dundee Business Park on the site of what used to house the Valentine greetings cards company and was something of a Dundee landmark.
It had been derelict for some years before Gladman bought it in 2007 from Keiller Estates and went on to get planning permission for a class-four office development.
Gladman is also working on a site in Aberdeen, but because of the state of the market it has postponed work on other sites in Scotland, at Livingston, Dunblane, Cumbernauld and Hillington.
But Gladman is an experienced spec specialist and has pushed on with its work in Dundee in the belief that it is providing the type of accommodation which is badly needed in the city – rents are £14.50 per sq ft, or the open plan offices can be bought for £175 per sq ft (joint agents are Knight Frank and Graham + Sibbald). The first 25,500sq ft headquarter offices building launched last week has not yet been officially named – but Valentine Court is on the cards.
Fifteen years in Aberdeen for global HQA NEW global HQ for Aberdeen – acting on behalf of Stewart Milne Developments, CB Richard Ellis (Scotland) has let a workshop, warehouse (38,000sq ft) and offices (19,000sq ft) facility on Howes Road, Bucksburn, to mechanical services company EnerMech. It's a 15-year lease, at an annual rental in the region of £375,000 and it is now EnerMech's global headquarters. The deal allows EnerMech, represented in the deal by AB Robb, to pool its engineering resources, integrate recent acquisitions and reduce operating costs.
• GVA Grimley has put together four deals which it says suggests that there might be signs of cautious optimism in a robust Glasgow office market. The main deal, on behalf of BT/Telereal, is a sub-let of the 7,727sq ft second floor of Westergate, Hope Street, to Glasgow Community Safety Services for the remainder of the head lease, expiring in 2014.
• THE site formerly occupied by Martin Frost Furniture in McDonald Road, Edinburgh, has been bought for £1.8 million by a cash-rich investor likely to plump for residential development. Rettie & Co did the deal on behalf of the Unite Group and the site attracted the interest of student housing groups, funds, care home operators, residential developers and registered social landlords.
• A TOTAL of 4,282sq ft has been sub-let at Capital House, Festival Square, Edinburgh, to Gigle Semiconductors, which specialises in making integrated circuits for multimedia home networking. It will move from Scott House in South St Andrew Street in Edinburgh and will pick up the remainder of a Royal Bank of Scotland lease at £21.50 a sq ft until September 2011. Jones Lang LaSalle and DTZ represented landlord Sterling Portfolio.
• THE Great British Mobility Company, which supplies mobility scooters, beds, baths and other orthopaedic furniture, has taken a 5,000sq ft unit at the New Houston business park, Livingston, at £7.25 a sq ft on a ten-year lease. Landlord SCOT Sheridan will complete a fit-out of the unit, with the tenant moving in July. Agents are Ryden and JA Pollock.
&149 A BRACE of deals at Rutherglen Shopping Centre, owned by Cairnduff Developments (Rutherglen). Pound Mart has moved into the former Woolworths at 214-218 Main Street (10,115 sq ft) at an annual rent of £60,000; and children's fashion retailer Little Cherubs has taken 1,295sq ft at 226 Main Street at £22,000. SGM Property Consultants acted for the landlord.
• Send deals details to jimdow@lumison.co.uk
